1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a conversion assembly and method for a vehicle, and more particularly, but not exclusively, to a conversion assembly and method for a front-wheel-drive vehicle for enabling or improving wheelchair accessibility to the vehicle.
2. Description of the Related Art
It has been previously proposed to modify a standard production motor vehicle to enable access to the vehicle by a person in a wheelchair. The converted vehicle must have an interior with sufficient distance between the floor and the roof to provide for headroom for the occupant of the wheelchair, and a sufficient width to accommodate the width of the wheelchair. Owing to such limitations of internal space and the necessity for a large door (usually in the form of a rear tailgate or a side sliding door), motor vehicles of the kind known as “people movers” or “vans” are popular for such conversions.
It is usually necessary to rearrange the interior of the vehicle to provide access for the wheelchair, for example by altering the standard seating arrangement of the vehicle to provide a space in the vehicle in which the wheelchair is able to be located during driving of the vehicle, and by lowering the floorpan of the vehicle in conjunction with raising the roof of the vehicle to provide sufficient headroom for an occupant of the wheelchair. The lowered portion of the floorpan provides a surface on which the wheelchair can roll from an entry means (typically in the form of a ramp or a lift) to the space in which the wheelchair is located during driving.
Conversions of this type have been performed on a motor vehicle in which the conventional suspension existing in the vehicle is of the kind having a rear beam axle configuration. In this conversion the floor is lowered in part, however as the ability to lower the floor is limited by the presence of the rear beam axle, previously proposed conversions profile the floorpan to accommodate the rear beam axle. This results in a hump or raised portion of the floorpan over the rear beam axle. As this previously proposed conversion is a rear-access conversion in which the wheelchair with occupant is loaded into the vehicle through a rear tailgate of the vehicle and is wheeled forwardly into the space in which the wheelchair is located during driving of the vehicle, the presence of the hump is problematic as it must be traversed during entry and exit to/from the vehicle. Furthermore, the presence of the hump also results in the headroom available for the wheelchair occupant being limited. In some cases, a wheelchair occupant in a converted vehicle of this kind has been known to hit his or her head on the roof of the vehicle when traversing the hump. The roof of the vehicle may be raised to improve headroom available to the occupant of the wheelchair, however this is typically undesirable for a number of reasons including that it results in the modifications to the vehicle being conspicuous.
One type of previously proposed conversion of a vehicle for enabling or improving wheelchair accessibility to the vehicle enables an occupant of a wheelchair to be seated as a passenger of the vehicle. Another type of previously proposed conversion of a vehicle enables an occupant of a wheelchair to drive the vehicle by providing a driver's seat which is movable to a position adjacent the wheelchair. The occupant of the wheelchair is able to transfer from the wheelchair to the driver's seat from where he or she is able to drive the vehicle. However, such a conversion is disadvantageous as it can be difficult, awkward, inconvenient and time-consuming for the occupant of the wheelchair to have to transfer from the wheelchair to the driver's seat to drive the vehicle and then to transfer back again to the wheelchair when he or she is to exit the vehicle.